Billionaire At Sea

Mia “Mia, are you there?” asked Ridley from the other end of the phone. “Yes,” I replied, gritting my teeth. “Why didn’t you tell me that we were catering a bachelor party?” “Because I knew you’d say ‘no’,” she said, matter-of-factly. “Because you knew I’d say… for God’s sake, Ridley, what in the world were you thinking?!” I snapped, seething inside. “You of all people should know that the last thing I want to do is place myself on a boat filled with drunken assholes for an entire week.” “Number one, it’s a yacht. Number two, they’re extremely rich assholes who will tip us very well. Number three, we only have to be around them for a couple of days and number four, the owner of the boat is Damian Stryker.” “Yeah, so?” I answered, not recognizing the name and not giving a rat’s ass if he was the president of the United States. The thought of being trapped, in the middle of the ocean, with a bunch of horned up, self-deserving men made my skin crawl. If anything, I was hurt. Hurt because Ridley, one of my best friends in the world, had to know how upsetting this would be. Especially since my ex had cheated on me at his own bachelor party less than a year ago.  “If you watched baseball, you’d know he’s the pitcher for the Tampa Bay–” “I don’t care who this Damian guy is,” I replied, pacing back and forth in my living room. “Seriously, Ridley, you know why I don’t want to do this.” “I’m sorry, Mia. I really thought you’d be over the incident with John by now. Besides, these are all strangers; for all we know, they’ll be very well behaved.” “I’m trying to get over it, but this certainly won’t help,” I said miserably. My heart still ached from the memory of walking into our newly built house the morning after his stag party. I’d been out of town for a catering convention with Ridley, and we’d returned earlier than planned. I’d found him naked and passed out in bed, but not alone. Apparently, one of the strippers from his party had given him a ride home in her fancy new Corvette, and then another in our bed. After waking him with a cold bucket of water, John had begged for my forgiveness, using the excuse that he hadn’t remembered anything. But from the smirk on the stripper’s face and the number of condom wrappers on the floor, I knew he was full of s**t.       “Look, I’m sorry I didn’t tell you. The truth is, we need this gig. I’m behind on some bills and if we don’t do something quickly, we’re going to lose the catering van,” said Ridley. I groaned. “Seriously?” “Seriously.” “I knew we should have taken that Bar Mitzvah party last weekend.” “I had the flu. We couldn’t.” “Maybe I could have tried doing it myself,” I murmured. “Listen to me – the guest list was too big and pulling it off would have been a nightmare.” “At least we’d have been paid,” I replied glumly. “We will be paid big time if we take this gig.” I didn’t say anything. “Come on, Mia,” she pleaded. “You even mentioned that you were having a hard time coming up with rent for next month. Damian Stryker is paying us enough money that you won’t have to worry about it for the next six.” I sighed. “Look, all we have to do is prepare the meals and hand them off to the servers. We’ll be in the kitchen most of the time and probably won’t be anywhere near the guests.” Admittedly, that didn’t sound completely horrible. “My brother told me that Damian’s yacht is ridiculously huge. Seriously, I’m sure we’ll never have to deal with any of the drunken idiots.” Mia’s brother was a sports agent and had a lot of connections. He’d been the one who’d set up our gig with Damian Stryker. When I’d first learned that we’d be spending an entire week cruising near the Virgin Islands, I’d been ecstatic. Now, I felt nothing but anxiety. “Is your brother going to be there?” Michael was a decent guy and someone who I trusted to keep things under control. “No,” she replied. “It’s a very private party and even he doesn’t know who’s going to be on the guest list. More than likely, a bunch of sports celebrities. You know, this could actually be the chance of a lifetime. It may even earn us more business, once they try our food.” As long as that was the only thing they tried tasting. I couldn’t speak for myself, but Ridley was beautiful and men were always asking her out. She had a boyfriend, however, and wasn’t the cheating kind. Even with someone rich, handsome, or famous.    “I guess it does sound like a great opportunity,” I admitted, reluctantly giving in. “And, as you said, it’s not like we have to be anywhere near these guys during the bachelor party.” “Exactly. All we have to do is make sure their tummies are happy. As far as other parts of their bodies, we’ll let the strippers, or hookers, worry about that.” “Yuck,” I replied, grimacing. “Do you really think there could be prostitutes at this thing?” “I don’t know. They certainly have the money to get whatever it is that they want. I can’t imagine a bachelor party without some kind of naked entertainment.” Hopefully, it would stop at pornos, but I didn’t believe we’d be so lucky. “So? What do you think? Are you in or out?” I stared outside of my living room window and smiled grimly. “What I think is that I’m crazy for agreeing to this.” “But, you’ll do it?” “Yes. It sounds like we don’t have a choice. We both obviously need the money.” She squealed. “This job is going to change our lives. I can feel it in my bones.” All I felt was a tight knot in the pit of my stomach. Something told me she was right, but at what price?